Christmas Baking + Christmas Dinner

Dear users, dear authors,
how’s your Christmas baking and Christmas dinner planning coming along?

Over in the thread about
saving money for Christmas (No Advertising)
people asked for a separate thread for Christmas dinner, so I’ve created this one here. Have fun with it.

Please only share your own recipes—don’t copy images or text from the internet. Thanks.

Dear Josefa, thank you so much for this thread, which is sure to provide us all with lots of delicious ideas for our Christmas cooking.

There are so many treats to bake for Christmas...
Yes, we always make this one treat every year: speculoos cookies . My husband bakes mountains of them, and everyone in the family loves them. They’re nothing like the store-bought ones.

The recipe comes from his family and has been passed down from generation to generation.
He’s given me permission to share it with you. Instead of the margarine people used to bake with, we use butter today.

I hope you all enjoy making them and have a wonderful Christmas season.

Warm regards, Ina

Nothing’s set in stone yet (except that I’m baking Monika’s delicious sheet-pan gingerbread next week, hehe!), but I’ll bookmark this thread for inspiration—thanks! 

Yes, Tina, we love that sheet pan gingerbread too, and it’ll be going back in the oven soon.

I’ve written out the recipe in detail in this thread:
https://www.crazypatterns.net/de/forum/topic/134526/mein-schneller-blech-lebkuchen-das-rezept

There are also photos there. Just looking at them makes me hungry.

Ina, the recipe sounds great. But don’t you need speculoos molds—or boards—for this?

Dear Petra, for us, it’s all about the taste. We always use regular cookie cutters. We have so many that everyone has their favorite ones.

Best regards, Ina

Oh, Ina, that recipe is great—it looks very “well-loved” 😁
I’ll have to try that too. 

Ina: Yeah, exactly. So, roll it out thin and cut out shapes? I should be able to manage that. 

Ina, one more question. The rock candy—isn’t that pretty coarse? Do you grind it up?

Dear Petra, “rock candy” refers to any type of caramelized sugar. You can buy rock candy that’s been finely ground, but you can also use any other type of brown sugar. The key is to avoid white sugar and use caramelized sugar instead.

Otherwise, just make cookie dough, roll it out thinly, and cut out shapes.

Best regards, Ina

Ina, thank you. You never stop learning!

Dear Ina, thank you so much for the great recipe.
I love speculoos cookies; I’ll definitely try this recipe.

Our family recipe is for “orange tongues”—they’re always gone in a flash.
260 g flour 100 g marzipan paste
100 g sugar 4 egg yolks
200 g butter
grated zest of one organic orange and
juice of half an orange
Cream the marzipan and butter until fluffy.
Add the sugar and egg yolks and beat until very fluffy.
Gently fold in the flour.
Pipe into small sticks, bake, and sandwich them together with jam.
Dip one end in chocolate.

@everyone
If anyone wants to try my speculoos recipe... my husband (who always bakes them) would like to point out that if you want a stronger speculoos flavor, you can use more of the spices—so use 6 knife-point amounts instead of 4.

Best regards, Ina

P.S. I’m baking johansi’s orange tongues today. We’re having some last-minute visitors, so I’ll give this a try on the spot.

.....great idea.....
The recipe is awesome 💖😍 I tried it right away, though I only made half the recipe....
Here’s how it turned out... 

Of course, this didn’t turn out to be cookie dough.... 😂😂😂 
 I baked this today.... It’s still undecorated, but I’m guessing it’ll “disappear” in some miraculous way before then. ... 

Oh Steffi, that’s such a lovely little edible Christmas tree. I can totally imagine people secretly snacking on it.

Today, for the second Sunday of Advent, we had a Mohnstolle. It’s a yeast cake with a poppy seed filling. For the Christmas version, marzipan, candied orange peel, raisins, and chopped almonds are added to the poppy seeds. Of course, it has to be topped with crumble and icing. The icing is mixed with lemon juice, so it has not only sweet flavors but also a fresh, zesty note.

Warm regards, Ina

Finished baking?